Yesterday, I took Jacob to his kindergarten well-child visit. We started kindergarten in August, but I never got around to taking him in for his shots, since I wasn't forced to by public school. The doctor was asking all sorts of questions, including what we were doing for school. After I told her we were homeschooling, Jacob said, "Yeah, but we're behind. Sometimes we don't do anything for... like, one or two months?" I laughed self-consciously and muttered something to the contrary.

When we got home, I tried to explain to Jacob how even if we don't use every school book every day, we are learning things every day; how even if it doesn't seem like school because it's fun, that it still counts as school at this age. I further explained how although we sometimes get behind in his science, history, or geography books, we aren't behind in his reading or math - in fact, we have been able to skip ahead in math because he had already mastered many of the concepts, so that is the reason our "workload" in that area has been less.

Anyway, it was kind of funny, even if it was embarrassing to me. I'm glad he doesn't think we are doing school, in a sense, because that means he doesn't feel like it's "cramping his style." On the other hand, it makes for difficult explanations to authority figures. I'm glad he doesn't think we're doing school when he practices writing words and sentences on scraps of paper or on the white board, when we play "games" of adding or subtracting numbers that Heath or I come up with on the spot, when we challenge him to fill in the missing number in a skip-counting sequence to keep him still at a restaurant, when we ask him to tell us the time, or allow him to sneak coins from Daddy's change basket so that he can gleefully count how much money he's collected. I'm glad he doesn't think of our bedtime reading from a chapter-book and the Bible as part of his school work, that he doesn't find it unusual or particularly scholarly when I casually discuss with him the next day what he and Daddy read the night before. That's just a part of normal life.

Perhaps more people would home school if they knew how natural and simple it can be. I know many don't because they are not otherwise at home full-time. But if you are already home full-time, then it is just a matter of seizing on opportunities that are constantly presenting themselves. Getting to observe and take part in my children's learning is really a blessing and the best part of my day. (I'll tell you about the hard parts of my day in a different blog entry...)

I do have a curriculum (which I highly recommend if you're interested), a lesson plan, and objectives that I constantly refer to, but I am often able to work the material into our lives in a very natural way simply by making the books available, offering to read to them, and talking to them about anything and everything in the world. I know as we move into first grade, second grade, third grade, and beyond, the material will require more sit-down, concentrated work to master. But hopefully, our habits of learning, pursuing knowledge and mastery of skills will be so ingrained by then that it still won't feel much like "school."

talking to the baby in the dishwasher

2008-1

Edit: If you click on the picture, you can watch a video of him. I'm not savvy enough yet to remember how to post the video itself.

almost crawling...

I saw this on thereligionofpeace.com, which was linked from someone's blog I was reading. I know some of you who read my blog are against the Iraq war, and I wondered what you thought about this. For that matter, if you support the Iraq war, I would like to hear what you think about it, too. Many of you might have previously seen iraqbodycount.net, which keeps track of civilian deaths in Iraq. This was obviously created in response to their counter.

The Real 2006
'Iraq Body Count'

16,791
Iraqi civilians killed last year by ISLAMIC Terrorists

225*
Iraqi civilians killed collaterally in incidents involving Americans
(and Islamic Terrorists)

Iraqis aren't
dying from war.
They are being murdered by
Islamic terrorists.

*Source: IraqBodyCount.net (includes civilians caught in crossfire who may have been killed by the terrorists, and terrorists who may have been counted as civilians)

Samuel started babbling last night! I was on the phone with Heath because he was letting me know he would be home late because of a thick sheet of ice on his windshield, and Samuel said "Da-da-ga-ja," or something to that effect. Apparently, he was telling Heath to get home quickly and safely.

His babbling had been limited to one or two isolated syllables up to this point. But today, he has been stringing together many syllables, and providing a continual monologue about his adventures. It is delightful. I am listening closely and hoping to hear him say "ma-ma" soon.

Today Jacob told me he was feeling pernicious. This was in response to me telling him to stop fighting with Ethan. He said he learned the word from "Word Girl." (PBS show)

Later, when he was chanting "Hungry, hungry!" at me, I told him that if he could use the word pernicious, then he could ask me for food with a full sentence. He said, "Mommy, it's per-nee-shus, not per-nih-shus." Apparently I pronounced it wrong? Or else Word Girl did, but it was probably me.

I stayed up reading until 1 am last night. I don't know when the last time I did that was! My mother-in-law sent us a book in the mail, and once I started reading it, I just couldn't put it down until I finished it. And it wasn't because I just had to know what was going to happen next, either. It was because this book was saying things to me that I desperately needed to hear!

The book is So You Don't Want to Go to Church Anymore, by Jake Colsen. (Don't worry, WM friends, the title of the book doesn't have anything to do with why I liked it.) The book is Jake's journal of 13 conversations with a close friend, occurring over the course of a four year period when his world is turned upside-down. It reminds me of the ideas that Karmen has shared with us that have changed her world over the last year. It reminds me of why we didn't want to be a part of certain churches anymore (this of course does not include Wheatland!). Most of all, it reminds me of the truth of God's unquenchable love and the reality of my inability to earn it or to be worthy of it - my inability to please him with my works done in my own strength, and the fact that He'd rather have me ditch those than have them get in the way of living in His love.

I started the day yesterday determined to be my own cognitive therapist - to journal the thoughts that were running through my head and to analyze which untrue or unproductive thoughts were causing me to get weighed down with anxiety or depression or confusion or anger. After a bit of thought, writing, and analysis, including an important discussion with Heath over the lunch hour, I felt like I had uncovered some of the thoughts and feelings that were troublesome to me, and replaced them with truer, more balanced ways of thinking. Then, when I began reading this book last night, it built on the process that had begun that morning, the process of ferreting out untrue and destructive thoughts and exposing them to the truth. It was a really good, much needed process, which will probably take a while to fully sink in and take root again. I say again because these truths are not new to me, but are things that I too easily forget and need to return to again and again.

So, in summary... If you want to be reminded of who God really is and to have your first love with Him renewed, you gotta get this book!

My friend Betsy posted her New Year's resolutions, and it made me think about my own. My problem is, when I consider things to change, I get bogged down thinking, "Now is that thing really important enough for the effort it will require?" For instance, I'd like to keep my house continually clean enough for company to drop in. However, company never drops in, so it's hard to motivate myself. Also, it takes quite a bit of work to maintain it at that level all the time. Do I really care that much? It helps when we have frequent weekend visitors because I keep doing a little bit each day, thinking, "I don't want to have to work myself to death the day before they get here to make it presentable." Thus, it's been in pretty good shape for 2 weeks. So who's coming next weekend? Anyone?

The one thing I know I want to do is eat less calories than I expend, i.e. lose weight. But that has been a resolution for most of my adult life, with more success at times and dismal failure at others. I also want to be a better wife and mother - every day and night I think about that one. Particularly in the way of being more consistently laid back, less moody, and having confidence in the right way to deal with misbehavior from the boys every time (I really need to figure out/decide what exactly that entails). I feel like there are a lot of things on my mind that fall into the "need to figure that out" category... Maybe I should make a list of those and see how many I have figured out by the end of the year.

So, anyone else have New Year's resolutions?